Fenton Regional Chamber of Commerce to market events without funding from Fenton Downtown Development Authority

FENTON, Michigan — Next week’s Taste in Fenton will be the last event the Fenton Regional Chamber of Commerce will receive funding for from the city of Fenton.

The Fenton City Council has pulled its Downtown Development Authority funding for the chamber, after some council members expressed concerns about the chamber’s endorsement policy.

Council Member Cheryl King, who has never been endorsed by the chamber, said she is against the chamber endorsing candidates.

“I don’t believe we should support political agendas and political people. Giving the money the way we did, I thought we were supporting political nominations,” she said.

The chamber has fired back after getting the $17,500 cut — which went to help promote Taste in Fenton, Fenton Freedom Festival, An Event So Good it’s Scary and Jinglefest — with a press release about its endorsement policy.

“They (city council members) feel the endorsement process is not fair and we’ve reviewed it time and time again and feel it’s a great way to educate the community,” said Gary McFarren, chamber board chair.

McFarren said the board wrote the news release because it has received several questions about the chamber’s endorsement process and why the chamber didn’t receive funding from the city.

The chamber has endorsed candidates for about 10 years.

“It’s pretty disappointing that the city is pulling marketing dollars due to an endorsement process that helps the community,” McFarren said.

The chamber’s endorsement policy is in its bylaws, McFarren said, and something the chamber will continue.

McFarren said the funding from the DDA was a “decent size portion” of its event marketing budget.

After pulling the DDA’s marketing funds, the city council hired a marketing firm for the DDA, which will be in charge of the marketing for those events as well as creating a marketing plan for the DDA.

McFarren said the chamber will have to rebudget and get creative with what marketing dollars it’ll have left for future events. The chamber, he said, doesn’t know how or in what capacity the DDA’s marketing firm will do its share of the event marketing.

The full effect of the cuts won’t be felt until next year, because the DDA already had contributed for this year’s Freedom Festival on the Fourth of July weekend and Taste in Fenton on Saturday.

Michael T. Burns, assistant city manager and DDA director, said he believes the DDA will be better served by having its own marketing firm than by cutting a check to the chamber.